MANORS.
The manor of NEWNHAM, which in
spite of repeated statements to the contrary (fn. 49) included the borough of Newnham and was presumably co-extensive with the borough, (fn. 50) belonged to
the Crown in the 11th century. (fn. 51) In 1086 it was
included, apparently, in the large royal estate of
Westbury, though not by name. (fn. 52) The king's
demesne in Newnham was mentioned in 1130. (fn. 53)
During Stephen's reign Miles, Earl of Hereford,
may have received a grant of the manor, (fn. 54) for it was
expressly excepted from the lands which Henry II
granted to Roger, Earl of Hereford, in 1154. (fn. 55) The
manor remained in the Crown's possession (fn. 56) until
1327, when it was granted to Thomas de Brotherton,
Earl of Norfolk, (fn. 57) who, however, had still not
obtained seizin in 1331 because the manor had
wrongly been stated to have been part of the
forfeited estates of the elder Hugh le Despenser. (fn. 58)
In 1332 the Earl of Norfolk surrendered the manor
to the king, who granted it to William de Bohun, (fn. 59)
created Earl of Northampton in 1337. In 1344
William Talmadge held 20 messuages, 2 ploughlands, 160 a. of meadow, woodland, and pasture, and
£20 rent in Newnham, possibly amounting to the
whole manor, by grant of William de Bohun, (fn. 60) but
the estate evidently reverted to the de Bohuns.
William de Bohun's son Humphrey succeeded his
father in 1360, and in 1361 succeeded his uncle as
Earl of Hereford and Essex. (fn. 61) At his death in 1373
he held Newnham, apparently in his own possession;
the statement that he held it by service of being
constable of England presumably resulted from
confusion with Haresfield manor, which he held
allegedly by that tenure. (fn. 62)
On the partition of the de Bohun estates between
Humphrey's daughters, Newnham was assigned to
Mary, wife of Henry of Lancaster, later Henry IV, (fn. 63)
who granted it for life to Thomas of Woodstock,
Duke of Gloucester (d. 1397), (fn. 64) the husband of
Mary's sister Eleanor. Eleanor's daughter and
eventual sole heir Anne, Countess of Stafford, (fn. 65)
received Newnham in 1421 when the partition of the
de Bohun estates was altered, (fn. 66) and her son
Humphrey Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, was
seised of rents and liberties there at his death in
1460. (fn. 67) Humphrey's great-grandson Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, was lord of the manor at
the time of his attainder in 1521, (fn. 68) and Newnham
was among the estates granted in 1554 to Edward's
son Henry, Lord Stafford. (fn. 69) In the interval the
manor or borough was held at farm, (fn. 70) and it was
again held by farmers in the late 16th century. (fn. 71)
Newnham descended with the Stafford peerage,
and in 1640, following the death in 1637 of Henry
Stafford, Earl of Stafford, was claimed as part of
the honors of Gloucester and Hereford by William
Howard, (fn. 72) who had married Mary, sister and heir
of Henry Stafford, and was created Viscount
Stafford. William was beheaded in 1680 and forfeited his estates, (fn. 73) but the next year Mary made a
settlement that included Newnham. (fn. 74) Their son was
created Earl of Stafford in 1688 and his successors
as earl held the manor until 1736 or later. (fn. 75) Before
the death of the last earl, John Paul Stafford-Howard,
in 1762, and possibly in 1751 on the death of his
nephew and predecessor, William Matthias StaffordHoward, (fn. 76) the manor passed to another branch of
the Howard family, for in 1759 Thomas Howard,
Earl of Effingham, was lord. (fn. 77) His son and heir, also
Thomas, held the manor at his death in 1791, and
by 1801 had been succeeded as lord of Newnham
by Henry Howard, (fn. 78) a younger brother of the Duke
of Norfolk. Henry Howard, who was M.P. for
Gloucester and by the assumption of a courtesy
title and additional surnames eventually became
known as Lord Henry Howard-Molyneux-Howard, (fn. 79)
held the manor until his death in 1824, and was
succeeded by Henry Howard, (fn. 80) his son, who with
the father's widow Elizabeth (fn. 81) sold the manor and
borough in 1835 to William Thomas. (fn. 82)
William Thomas sold the manor in 1850 to John
James of Newnham. (fn. 83) James died in 1855, (fn. 84) but his
executors retained the manor until 1866 when they
conveyed it to W. H. Collins, who in turn conveyed
it in 1876 to Tom Goold of Newnham. (fn. 85) In 1879
Tom Goold was succeeded by C. A. Goold, (fn. 86) who
in 1886 sold the manor to Russell James Kerr (fn. 87) of
the Haie; Kerr was already lord of Ruddle manor,
with which Newnham manor thereafter descended. (fn. 88)
There is no evidence that there was any manorhouse, other than the castle, in the town; the large
early-19th-century house on the west side of High
Street that was called Manor House from 1879 (fn. 89) was
apparently so named only because it belonged to the
Goolds. (fn. 90)
Before the Conquest RUDDLE was held by Tovi,
and in 1086 by Walter Arblaster (Balistarius). (fn. 91)
Soon afterwards the manor passed to Ralph Blewett,
who granted it to Gloucester Abbey; the grant had
been made by 1100, when the Bishop of Hereford
granted the abbey two-thirds of the tithes of their
demesne in Ruddle, (fn. 92) and in 1114 the Crown confirmed Ralph Blewett's gift. (fn. 93) Henry I also made a
grant to the abbey's sacrist of the manor, a fishery,
and the right to hold the wood of Southridge outside
the regard of the forest; another Crown grant
associated the tenure of the manor, in free alms,
with the maintenance of lights for the soul of Robert
Curthose, in terms suggesting that the king himself
had given the manor. (fn. 94)
The abbey retained Ruddle manor until the
Dissolution. In 1539 George Baynham received a
lease of the manor at farm for 21 years; (fn. 95) his widow
Cecily married Sir Charles Herbert, who in 1552
conveyed the lease to Walter Flower and his sons
John and Richard. (fn. 96) In 1553 the Crown granted
the manor in fee to William Herbert, Earl of
Pembroke, who in 1557 sold it to Sir Giles Poole. (fn. 97)
Poole died in 1589; his son and heir Sir Henry (fn. 98) was
succeeded in 1616 by his son Henry, (fn. 99) who was lord
of Ruddle in 1625. (fn. 1) In the early 19th century one of
the Pooles, possibly Henry, was said to have sold
the manor and tithes of Ruddle to William Jones of
Nass in 1734; (fn. 2) the sale may have been 100 years
earlier, for no record of the Pooles' lordship after the
early 17th century has been found, and a rental of
the manor in 1633 appears to have been made with
a view to reaching a purchase price. (fn. 3) Certainly the
Joneses had acquired Ruddle by 1678, when Charles
Jones of Nass agreed to settle it on the marriage of
his son William with Anne Morgan. (fn. 4) William may
have been the Mr. Jones of Nass recorded as lord
of Ruddle c. 1703. (fn. 5) In 1735 and 1763 another
William Jones of Nass, son and heir of Roynon
Jones, was lord of Ruddle. His son, another Roynon
Jones, (fn. 6) was lord in 1791 (fn. 7) and was succeeded c. 1815
by his son the Revd. Edward, (fn. 8) who in 1839 owned
660 a. in Ruddle. (fn. 9) Edward Jones died in 1847, and
in 1850 his son the Revd. Edward Owen Jones (fn. 10) sold
the estate of 920 a. in Ruddle to William Willets, (fn. 11)
who in turn sold it in 1857 to William Charles Kerr. (fn. 12)
Kerr was succeeded in 1878 by his son Russell
James (d. 1910), whose son Sir Russell James Kerr,
chairman of the Gloucestershire County Council
1920-31, (fn. 13) conveyed the estate before his death in
1952 to his nephew Andrew Kerr, the owner in
1968. (fn. 14)
The manor-house of Ruddle was evidently the
house described in the later 13th century as the new
court of the sacrist of Gloucester Abbey. (fn. 15) A house
existed in 1618 (fn. 16) on the site of Ruddle Court, which
was perhaps the house with 8 hearths occupied by
James Jefferies in 1662 and 1672, (fn. 17) and was evidently the 'site house' of 1713 (fn. 18) and the chief house
mentioned in 1735. (fn. 19) The house was rebuilt in the
late 18th century as a three-storied, rough-cast
farm-house. About 1770 Roynon Jones built for
himself a 'handsome house' at Hayhill, (fn. 20) where there
had been no building in 1618. (fn. 21) The site, over 300 ft.
above the Severn, has commanding views; in 1850
the house was said to be substantially built, presenting a good elevation. (fn. 22) A surviving part of the
18th-century house shows it to have been of stone,
but the main part was apparently replaced by a
two-story stone block, with Dutch gables on the
east elevation, during the ownership of William
Willetts, who called the house Newnham Park. (fn. 23) A
further massive stone block, in Tudor style and
incorporating an entrance portico, was added on the
north in 1883, (fn. 24) and a single-story pavilion wing of
similar date was added on the west. The house,
which was renamed the Haie by the Kerrs, (fn. 25) was
separated from the rest of the estate and sold c.
1947, and was converted into more than a dozen
dwellings. (fn. 26)
Of three estates that William son of Baderon held
in Newnham in 1086, one, held in 1066 by Ulfeg,
was called STAURE, (fn. 27) later the manor otherwise
called STAIRS or STEARS. Unlike William's
Newnham estate called the Hyde, (fn. 28) Stears did not
become part of the honor of Monmouth, from which
the fee of Staure was distinguished c. 1240. (fn. 29) Stears
may have been held by a succession of men surnamed
of Staure: Leofric and William in the later 12th
century, (fn. 30) Gilbert in 1199, (fn. 31) Alexander in the early
13th century, (fn. 32) John in 1277. (fn. 33) In 1308 William of
Staure died holding a house, rent, and 40 a. at
Stears as of Rodley manor, leaving as heir his son
William. (fn. 34) A William of Staure witnessed a deed of
1340; (fn. 35) Thomas and John Staure each owned a mill
in Newnham in 1418, (fn. 36) and in 1421 John Staure
was described as of Staures. (fn. 37) John was recorded as
holding land of another estate in the parish in 1437 (fn. 38)
but no later reference has been found to the Staure
family of Stears.
By 1539 the manor of Stears, as it was then called,
had passed to William Aylburton, who died in that
year holding it together with the woodwardship of
Blaize Bailey and a forestership in fee in the Forest
of Dean. His son and heir Thomas (fn. 39) died in 1580
having settled Stears, which was held as of Rodley
manor, on his wife Mary and leaving as heir his
brother John. (fn. 40) In 1614 John's son William held the
estate by gift of his uncle Thomas. (fn. 41) It may have
passed by 1622 to another John Aylburton, who had
land in that part of the parish. (fn. 42) In 1662 William
Aylburton had one of the larger houses in the
parish, with six hearths, (fn. 43) but it may not have been
Stears, for in the first decade of the 18th century a
Mr. Aylburton was said to have a good house and
estate at a time when Stears was the seat of William
Morwent. (fn. 44) Seventy years later Morwent's house at
Stears had fallen into decay. (fn. 45) The estate passed by
devise to one Baron, who sold it to Thomas Morris, (fn. 46)
the owner in 1803. (fn. 47) Morris died in 1815, his wife
Mary in 1858, and their son Thomas in 1862, (fn. 48)
when the estate amounted to 101 a. The house and
90 a. were bought by the Revd. H. Fowler, (fn. 49) and
were let to tenant farmers. The farmer in 1927 was
David Hinds, (fn. 50) and his family owned and occupied
Stears in 1968. The house is a three-story building
of stone, rough-cast; behind the main range a
projecting early-17th-century staircase wing is
flanked by two later, gabled wings. A stone with the
date 1612 was formerly visible, (fn. 51) and much of the
internal woodwork, including panelling, doors, and
doorways, is of that period.
The estate called Newnham, comprising a hide of
land, that William son of Baderon held in 1086 (fn. 52) is
to be identified with the estate later called HYDE.
With other lands of William's (fn. 53) it descended to the
Monmouth family: (fn. 54) Hugh Charke held it c. 1195
from Bertha of Monmouth, (fn. 55) and his son Hugh held
it c. 1240 as part of the fee of John of Monmouth. (fn. 56)
Four centuries later, in 1635, John Braban was
described as of Hyde, (fn. 57) and in 1747 Hyde Farm was
said to have been lately occupied by Edward
Braban. (fn. 58) In the early 18th century the Hyde estate
belonged to John Hampton, and was divided
between his five daughters. A succession of conveyances resulted in an equal division c. 1747 of the
whole estate between two of the children of Sarah
Hampton and Richard Wintle, namely Richard
Wintle and Elizabeth wife of Richard Webb. (fn. 59) Webb
may have acquired the whole, and in 1760 he offered
Hyde Farm and 200 a. in Newnham and Westbury
for sale. (fn. 60) Lancelot Cannock owned Hyde c. 1785, (fn. 61)
Thomas Cannock in 1809 and 1824, (fn. 62) and Benjamin
Mayo in 1839 and 1841. (fn. 63) In the sixties it belonged
to the Morris family, (fn. 64) and it was offered for sale
with 165 a. in 1878. (fn. 65) The decayed house called the
Hyde, belonging to John Trigge of Hill House in
1645 (fn. 66) and sold in 1762 to Robert Pyrke by Anne,
wife of Gen. Robert Napier and widow of Thomas
Trigge, (fn. 67) may have been Little Hyde, which was
farmed by Thomas Morris in 1812. (fn. 68) In the earlier
20th century both Hyde and Little Hyde were
owned by members of the Wiltshire family. (fn. 69) The
house at Hyde is of brick, built in two parts in the
late 18th century; its barn, of four cruck-framed
bays with large curved braces in the side walls, is of
the 16th century or earlier. The house at Little
Hyde was rebuilt in stone in the Gothic style c.
1870.
A third estate held by William son of Baderon in
1086, which comprised 2½ yardlands and had been
held by William's ancestor Wihanoc though the
county said that it was part of the king's demesne of
Westbury, (fn. 70) is assumed to have been in Newnham. (fn. 71)
Much later it may have been represented by the
HILL HOUSE estate, which like William son of
Baderon's manor of Stears was held of Rodley
manor. Hill House belonged to Thomas Trigge in
1576 and 1605 and to his son John in 1635 and 1645.
In 1645 John settled Hill House and other property
on his brother Thomas, but it was apparently
another Thomas Trigge who owned Hill House in
1668 and c. 1703, and whose son John owned it in
1738. John's son and heir Thomas settled Hill
House in 1741 on his marriage with Anne Brodrick,
and by 1765 it belonged to Robert Pyrke, (fn. 72) who had
bought an estate at Hyde from the same Anne three
years before. (fn. 73) Pyrke, whose family had been
prominent in Newnham from the late 16th century, (fn. 74)
died insolvent (fn. 75) between 1777 and 1780. (fn. 76) Hill
House was occupied in 1804 by Thomas Tovy, (fn. 77) but
Martha Edmunds, who lived there in 1821, (fn. 78) was
evidently Pyrke's widow. (fn. 79) The owners in 1839
appear to have been trustees, (fn. 80) but by 1856 it was
the home of James Wintle (fn. 81) who practised as a
solicitor in Newnham from 1840 until a few years
before his death in 1899. (fn. 82) Wintle's trustees sold the
house in 1908, (fn. 83) and it became the home of Walburga,
Lady Paget, who renamed it Unlawater House. In
1938 it became a residential hotel, (fn. 84) was temporarily
occupied by an assurance company during World
War II, and was thereafter used as a children's home
called Newnham House. (fn. 85) The house, which
apparently had five hearths in 1662 (fn. 86) stood in a
small park in 1824. (fn. 87) The western part of the
building in 1968 was an L-shaped stone structure
with internal fittings of the early 18th century. The
only visible evidence of an earlier house on the site
is part of a carved stone fireplace lintel which has
been uncovered in the hall and is said to carry the
date 1547. (fn. 88) The hall, with its former entrance front
facing south, has elaborate early-18th-century
panelling, Ionic columns, and round-arched doorcases. The design of the staircase west of the hall
resembles that of the contemporary stair at the
Victoria Hotel. Later in the 18th century a new and
loftier range was added on the east side of the house,
presumably for Robert Pyrke. Its east front has a
parapet pierced with oval openings, a modillion
cornice, and two bows to the full height flanking a
pedimented doorway. The mullioned and transomed
windows to the house and the curious dormers on
the south front are presumably alterations of c. 1908.
The estate that centred on BLYTHES COURT,
otherwise called the CULVER HOUSE, belonged
to the family of Blythe or Bleith, whose surname
also survives in the name Blaize Bailey. (fn. 89) Walter
Blythe witnessed a late-12th-century deed of
Flaxley Abbey that alluded to Newnham. (fn. 90) William
Blythe's court stood near the boundary of Blaize
Bailey in 1282. (fn. 91) He died in 1306 holding in Newnham a chief house, 60 a., and the rents of 10 cottagers for a rent of 5s. payable at St. Briavels Castle
and by serjeanty of being a knight forester in the
Forest of Dean; (fn. 92) he left a widow Joan (fn. 93) and a son
John who came of age in 1310. (fn. 94) John Blythe witnessed a deed in 1341, (fn. 95) the last occasion on which
the family has been found recorded in the parish.
In 1437 John Staure and William Hill held land
called Blythesland for a rent of 5s. (fn. 96)
In 1591 John Tomes was described as of the
Culver House, (fn. 97) which was evidently the same as
Blythes Court, (fn. 98) and by 1614 the property had
descended from John to Edmund Tomes. (fn. 99) In 1619,
however, John Hill owned Blythes Court along with
much other property in the parish, and in 1633 was
succeeded by his son Richard (fn. 1) who in 1634 claimed
to hold a plough-land in Newnham called Blythes
Court, the bailiwick of Blaize Bailey, and a forestership belonging to Blythes Court with various rights
within the forest. (fn. 2) The estate evidently remained in
the possession of the Hill family c. 1703, when it
belonged to Mrs. Anne Hill. (fn. 3) In 1709, however, it
was occupied by John Pyrke, who had a life interest,
while the reversion belonged to Gilbert Hearne. On
Hearne's death in 1716 his wife Joyce sold the
reversion to John Jelfe, (fn. 4) who conveyed it in 1717 to
Miles Beale of Newent (d. 1748). Miles's son John
was succeeded in 1775 by his uncle Thomas (d.
1784), whose son the Revd. Thomas Beale (d. 1805)
devised Blythes Court to his nephew Thomas Beale
Cooper, who in 1851 sold the estate, comprising
190 a., to John James of Blythes Court or Culver
House; tenants had occupied the estate throughout
the Beales' ownership. James died in 1855 and his
trustees sold the estate in 1865 to W. H. Collins. In
1872 Collins redeemed the annual rent of 5s. still
payable to the Crown, and in 1875 he sold the estate
to C. A. Goold. (fn. 5) Soon afterwards, apparently in
1876, (fn. 6) the estate was again sold and became merged
with the Kerrs' estate of Ruddle or the Haie, to
which it still belonged in 1968. (fn. 7)
The house, known as the Culver House in the
mid 20th century, stands on a commanding site
overlooking the Severn. A house evidently existed, as
indicated above, in 1282 and was the chief house
recorded in 1306. In 1662 and 1672 the Hills' house
had 6 hearths. (fn. 8) That was the old house, apparently
two separate dwellings in 1716, (fn. 9) described as having
the appearance of a mansion or court house; it was
rebuilt as a brick farm-house by John Beale, whose
initials are on the weather-cock over the stables, for
his tenant Walter Taylor, perhaps in 1767. (fn. 10) By
1856 the adjacent farm-house appears to have been
built. (fn. 11) The main house may have been remodelled
for the younger R. J. Kerr, who lived there from c.
1897 to 1902, since when it has been let as a private
house. (fn. 12)
Two monastic estates in Newnham cannot be
readily identified with holdings in the 17th century
and later. Flaxley Abbey acquired lands in the parish
in the 12th century (fn. 13) and in the 14th (fn. 14) which were
granted with the abbey's other estates to Sir William
Kingston in 1537 (fn. 15) and to Sir Anthony Kingston in
1543, (fn. 16) and which Edmund Kingston was licensed
to alienate in 1563. (fn. 17) The lands in Newnham were
referred to in the 16th century as the manor of
Newnham, and both Anthony Kingston (d. 1591)
and his son William (d. 1614) were said to have held
the manor. William's heir was his uncle Edmund
Kingston. (fn. 18) Llanthony Priory's estate in Newnham
was recorded in 1293. (fn. 19)
One of the two monastic estates may have been
COCKSHOOT, marked on a map of the late 16th
century. (fn. 20) In 1634 William Rowles of Newnham
owned the house called the Cockshoot, which he
had bought from Richard and John Brayne, with
110 a. or more. (fn. 21) He died in 1637, and his son
William in 1694. The younger William's grandson
Rowles Scudamore (fn. 22) apparently sold the estate in
1708 to Nicholas Lane, (fn. 23) although soon afterwards
Cockshoot was said to be the house of Mr. Rowles. (fn. 24)
Later in the 18th century it passed into the ownership of the Pyrkes, who were said to retain it c.
1807. (fn. 25) Joseph Pyrke (formerly Watts) of Littledean,
great-nephew and heir of Thomas Pyrke, was the
owner in 1803, (fn. 26) and his son Joseph in 1839. (fn. 27) The
house, a rendered stone farm-house, was apparently
completely rebuilt in the 18th century.
The other monastic estate may have been LUMBARS, which John Morse of Newnham bought with
40 a. from Sir Robert Cooke of Highnam in 1622 and
sold with 60 a. to Henry Yate of Bristol in 1629.
Yate's daughter Mary and her husband Edward
Prince sold Lumbars in 1643 to Josias Clutterbuck,
whose son Sir William sold it in 1707 to Jonathan
Chinn, a mariner of Newnham. (fn. 28) Shortly afterwards
Mr. Chinn was described as having a good house
and estate, (fn. 29) but in 1741 Lumbars was occupied by
Godwin Scudamore as tenant to Thomas Chinn, (fn. 30)
Jonathan's son. In 1801 Elizabeth Chinn, widow of
Thomas's son Jonathan, sold the estate, (fn. 31) apparently
to James Fream, (fn. 32) members of whose family owned
and occupied the farm (fn. 33) until it was sold, with 55 a.,
in 1869. (fn. 34) Thereafter the house apparently went out
of use as a dwelling, and collapsed or was demolished
soon after 1921. (fn. 35)